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Monday, December 3, 2012

Game of Thrones Season 3

I still haven't read any of the books, but I absolutely love the television show. Here's a sneak peak into the production of Season 3, which premiers on march 31 (and hey-- that's only a few months away!):

The locations they find for this show are really amazing. I love the fact that the actors have an appreciation for that aspect of the production, which I think goes a long way to making the show feel real, rather than the endless parade of shows in the 1980's that all looked like they took place in southern California because, well, they all were shot in southern California. Can't wait!

14 comments:

I started reading the novels because of the series. I've only seen the first season, which I understand corresponds to the first novel, because I am watching them on DVDs from Netflix. I haven't gotten very far in the first book yet, and huge books like that intimidate me (807 pages? seriously?), but I should finish it soon enough and move on to the next one.

yeah, seasons 3 and 4 will cover book 3. then...it gets weird. books 4 and 5 take place at roughly the same time, so they claim the show will stop directly following the books and just follow events as they see fit. episode 9 of this season should touch off another internet s-storm lol.

I myself haven't read the books yet, but I will eventually. Not that they intimidate me, rather that I can't afford to get them right now.

I've watched season 1 and 2 and loved them both, so I'm really looking forward to the next season and the next after that. I really hope they get to go all the way and wont get cancelled with a season or two still to be made. That would be a bummer!

I have no idea, since I've read neither. But Hamlet was talking as if he knew they did.

But I know from a friend who's reading them, that the character of Ros (the whore from Winterfell) doesn't have that many appearences in the books, the originals, in fact she's only mentioned in Winterfell.And they admit on the commentary track of the DVD, that they've changed a few things here and there to speed up the pace. For instance the Stark family is introduced much sooner than in the books. Much like Peter Jackson did with LotR, I'm thinking of how the hobbits got their weapons in the movie vs. the books.

But it's been seen before that some nimwit thinks it a great idea to adapt the movie/series back to books instead of just keeping the originals.

Actually, "the character of Ros" doesn't exist in the novels. Yes, there are prostitutes in the Winter Town outside of Winterfell, but none of them are named and none of them are, as of yet, significant in any real way.

The differences between the books and the show are . . . numerous, but generally fall out to a few types. First, and obviously, changes made in consideration of different media. Things you can do in a book that you just cannot do in a show or movie. For example, season 1, Arya is running about in the cellars/dungeons below the keep exploring and witnesses Varys and Illyrio plotting. It's obvious who they are and, to an adult, what they are plotting. In the novel, that scene exists, but we get it entirely through the filters of an 8-9 year old girl. We don't know who those two are and, though we the audience know or suspect what is being plotted, we don't know the details of what is being discussed. It's much more ambiguous and much less concrete.

On top of that, lots of condensed characters since it's hard to keep track of, let alone afford to pay, so many actors for so many minor roles.

I don't have a problem with this, in theory, though I will quibble about how, at times, it seems that it could have been more artfully done.

Second, significant changes to characterization or plot. This is where I get a little argumentative. On the one hand, yeah, I recognize that some changes have to be made. Again, move/show versus novel. However, there are a number of things that have been changed that, in my opinion mind, didn't need to be changed and shoudln't have been changed. Notable among them, Dany and Drogo's first ride together. It was something entirely other in the novel (and those who have read the scene will recognize the difference between what was in the show and what was in the text). A change from something relatively tender and gentle to . . . essentially rape.

Ros is another one of those things. For the life of me, I can't determine her purpose in the damned show except to serve as an extremely thinly veiled excuse to have more boobs and more sex, and to eat up screen time. Maybe I'm just missing the point there, but I might just be distracted by a pretty naked redhead after all.

The third thing, and this bothers me more than just about anything else, the amping up of the sex. Or, rather, the peurility of it. I've said it before, but it seems as if the show creators have retained a 15 year old boy as an advisor. "You know what this scene needs? More boobs. Make it happen." It's given us the phrase "sexposition," as if they are assuming the audience is too dull, tenuous, or disinterested to pay attention to subtle plot and dialogue elements without having on screen sex at the same time. Granted, there's lots of sex in the books, but by comparison, the show just dials that right on up to the max they can get before it becomes a stag flick. And the instances in the book always struck me as less about titilation than they did about something else.

Anyway, that's all just my personal beef here. My personal qualms. It's still a good show for all that.

As for the show taking over the novels, it's not that I have specific fears that I can put a finger on, but . . . well . . . ok, compare it to, of all things, the Harry Potter stuff. And yes, I'll admit to reading the books, even more than once.

Stop laughing.

In the first two or three books, the character of Snape is revolting, vile, horrible, and downright villanous. He's literally greasy, smelly, and turns of the skeevy factor as far as it can go in a children's story.

Hamlet: Thank you for that. I think I understand your meaning, and I can see the areas that were changed more clearly (I am still reading the first book, and have only seen the first season of the show).

Another example you might have chosen, I think, is 2010: Odyssey Two. In the original novel, the planet that is the destination of the Discovery is Saturn. That was changed to Jupiter in the movie because the effects people couldn't figure out how to make rings (they were able to do so for the movie Silent Running). In the second novel, the planet is changed to Jupiter to match the movie.

Indeed, though Clarke did, in fact, make a point in the intro to the 2010 novel to point out that, thinking back, thematically and scientifically, Jupiter just made more sense and he's not quite sure why he picked Iapetus around Saturn instead.

yeah, they've changed or eliminated many, many things from the books...but it doesn't bother me much. the books are the books and the show is the show. the only quibbles i have with the show: the direwolves are WAAAAAAAAAAAAY more involved with the story then as presented in the show - the warging aspect of the stark children (minus bran) has been ignored...and the virtual disappearance of rhaegar and lyanna from the storyline. i know they're both dead when the story begins - making flashbacks hard to justify - but they're CRUCIAL to the plot and i feel like the show has marginalized them and your average viewer has little to no idea who they are when they are brought up. no to mention the rampant clues that their kid is pretty important...

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